STRANGE BUT TRUE

• It was noted Spanish filmmaker Luis Bunuel who made the following sage observation: “Age is something that doesn't matter, unless you are a cheese.”

• You might be surprised to learn that we call coffee beans aren't actually beans — they're the pits of the coffee beans.

• Would you believe me if I told you that there were parachutists (better known now as skydivers) before there were airplanes? Yep, it's true! In Paris in the year 1900, a man leaped from the Eiffel Tower and made a safe descent using a parachute. It wasn't until December 17, 1903, that the Wright Brothers made the first controlled, sustained powered flight in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.

• According to statisticians, about 200 people a year die while watching — not playing — football.

• Of all the stamps that have been used by the U.S. Postal Service, more have featured George Washington than any other person; so far there have been 305 with the likeness of the nation's first president.

• If you ever make a trip to Alaska, you might want to keep in mind the fact that it is illegal there to wake a sleeping bear for the purpose of taking its picture. • We don't often associate museums with beverages, but it seems that they're fairly popular throughout the world. For instance, museums dedicated to coffee and/or tea can be found in London, Moscow, Paris, Sao Paolo, Zurich and Kyoto, as well as in China, South Korea, Colombia and Angola. Germany has three of them. Coffee and tea must be quite popular in the Netherlands; museums dedicated to the beverages can be found there in five different cities.

Thought for the Day:

“Testing can show the presence of errors, but not their absence.”

— Edsger Wybe Dijkstra